What Should I Do When Someone Steals My Remote?

Did you know that one of the most prominent means of breaking into a house nowadays is by stealing someone’s garage door remote and entering through the garage? Imagine approaching your car only to notice that the remote is no longer clipped to your visor or located where you typically keep it. You search around for a moment to no avail. Someone has stolen your garage door remote. This may seem insignificant until you remember that the registration papers for your car (usually conveniently stored in the glovebox) contain your home address. As of 2016, approximately 88% of all burglaries in the United States are residential and 77% of all crimes are property-based crimes. Identity theft is indisputably the most rapidly growing crime throughout America and you do not intend to become an addition to this statistic because someone stole your garage door remote. So how does one fix this issue or prevent it from ever occurring again?

Consider Deprogramming the Remote

Every garage door remote works in the same manner: a signal is sent to a receiver in the housing unit of the opener. If your opener was manufactured after 1993, then the remote will most likely use a rolling code, meaning the transmission code changes with every use. If you are certain that your remote has been stolen, you should consider disabling the remote so the potential burglar is not capable of stealing your precious possessions.

How To Disable Your Remote

The first step to deprogramming your remotes is to locate the colored Smart Button on the motor housing. Hold this button for a few seconds and all of the remotes currently linked with the opener will be deprogrammed. Whoever stole your remote will be out of luck.

Assuming you still have another remote, you will have to reprogram it along with any keypads in order to use them with your opener again. In order to do this, you can either refer to one of our previous posts regarding the reprogramming of your remotes or you can read your owner’s manual for more detail.

Another method of ensuring your possessions stay safe is to lock the opener. If you have a control panel, it will have a LOCK button which will disable the opener from being used without deprogramming any of the remotes. You may still use the control panel itself to open and close the door.

What if You Don’t Have a Control Panel?

If you do not have a control panel, then simply unplugging your garage door opener until you’ve resolved the issue will suffice. In order to continue using the door, you will need to pull the emergency release cord (which will typically have a red handle). This allows you to manually operate the door.

How Can I Prevent This From Happening?

If you want to prevent future theft from happening in regards to burglars accessing your garage, you may install extra locks and security features as well as various applications on your phone to monitor the activity of your opener. You can also ensure that your remotes are kept in secure areas not in direct view, so as to prevent alluring a potential thief. If you have any questions regarding the security of your garage, feel free to contact us by phone or email!